Chapter 12
12
Mum had loaned me her twenty-five-year-old Fiat Multipla, a car model which had won Ugliest Car of the Nineties. But it did the job, getting me to the outskirts of Galway city in two and a half hours. Keeping me company was a disembodied woman with a cut-glass accent reading a Barbara Vine novel.
After Galway, the roads gradually narrowed and once I was through Oughterard, the landscape went full-on desolate. A thin line of black tarmac, with faded white road markings, twisted its way through rough grass and rocky, uneven ground.
On my right side, hills began to appear. Eventually, they became mountains, monsters of gray stone, appearing semi-covered with green moth-eaten blankets.
Above it all, a huge parchment sky soared. Suddenly only Sigur Rós would do: the expansive, poignant chords were perfect for this lonely grandeur.
Occasional bursts of silver light flashed from the land—small pools, I realized. Then a proper lake appeared, the water the same pale blue as huskies’ eyes, so still that the nearby gray-green mountains were reflected perfectly in the surface.
A sudden longing to hire a camper van struck me. To just get in and drive forever with…my automatic thought was Angelo. For a split second I’d forgotten we were over.
It was a break-up like none other I’d had. When Shane and I had ended I’d been devastated. (I believe he lives in Thailand and has a pilot’s licence now. Godspeed. I wish him nothing but the best.) The great love of my life, Aidan, was killed in a car accident; we’d only been married for ten months. It was years before I was halfway normal again. I’d sincerely thought that love was off the cards forever, but along came Angelo, and offered me exactly what I needed.
Now that was over, but he was okay and I was okay. So, I’d go off in my imaginary camper van with myself.
A black and white signpost appeared, the first evidence of civilization in ages: Maumtully was only twelve kilometers away. My stomach clenched. But I was able to do this. Yes, I was. I was an adult and a professional, I’d faced down worse.
At the final fork in the road before Maumtully, I veered off onto a finger of land which eventually led to the ocean. A quick detour to visit Colm was in order.
I bumped down a narrow track, until, without warning, a sharp turn revealed the most beautiful house in the world. Made from glass, blue slate, and stones in every color of gray from lead to silver, I had to swallow hard.
At the sound of my car, a lanky young man came into the yard: Brigit’s eldest son, Lenehan.
“Anna?” His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. “How was your journey?” He was twenty but his freckled skin looked as soft as a peach.
“I’m so sorry about Queenie.” I wanted to squeeze him.
“It’s bad, all right. Thanks…Would you like a tea? No? Okay. Jump in the jeep there, I’ll take you up to the site.”
“I’ll just say hi to Colm first.”
“Oh. Ah. Sure…He’s round the back.”
My time in New York had overlapped with Colm’s by a couple of years. Even though he was the nicest, most open person, I’d been in awe. He was one of those rare types who made things happen. He and his roommates Travis and Otto ran once-a-month club nights which felt like the best house parties ever, where the playlist was always an unsnobby delight, geared towards making people dance rather than showcasing the DJ’s directional credentials. For four years in a row, it was on the Ten Best Clubs in New York.
The trio were always going to go on and do big things. Travis opened his first private members’ club maybe fifteen years ago. Casa now had twelve outposts, spanning the globe from S?o Paulo to Sydney. Mumbai was the latest. Otto, a “lighting guru,” choreographed light shows for stadium tours. Colm, working in IT, living in Connemara with his wife and four children seemed—at least on paper—like the underachiever. But look at him now, with his feathery-strokery retreat.
Despite the different directions they’d chosen, the three men still worked together. Colm did “consultancy” for Travis, where he, Brigit and their children visited his latest property and in return for a free holiday, gave their feedback. It was probably in Casa Mumbai that Brigit had got her yellow rubber clogs.
At the rear of the house, sitting on steps and staring at nothing, was Colm.
He looked stunned to see me. “Anna…”
Shocked, I stopped. Even though I’d been warned, I’d still expected charming, chatty Colm, with his messy glamour.
This poor man was gray and defeated.
I hugged him. “I’m so sorry about Queenie.”
“And I’m sorry I’m so fucking useless. Are you here because of the carry-on with the paint?”
“Yes. Lenehan and I, we’ll head over to the site and…” There was nothing to be gained from lingering here, making small talk with a man who wasn’t capable.
Colm nodded and resumed his sightless staring.
God love him. And poor Lenehan too—he was only twenty, this was a lot .
“Ree!” Lenehan called to a teenage boy, aged about fifteen, in the kitchen, staring at a screen. “Say hi to Anna.”
Ree smiled. “Hi to Anna.”
There was another brother, a year younger than Lenehan. “Sully? Is he around?”
“In Bolivia. ‘Preserving wetlands.’ That’s the cover story anyway. More like partying his head off.” Lenehan’s smile trembled.
After a short, bumpy drive through a landscape which looked as if it had been ripped apart, then thrown carelessly back together, Lenehan spoke. “The damage in the cottages. It looks worse than it is.”
He was trying to convince himself more than me. “A forklift was stolen. So were lots of pipes and timber. And they put sand in the tank of the digger.”
“That’s…bad, is it?”
“The engine will seize up if they try using it. It can be fixed but it’ll be out of action for a while. Hold on.” He was out of the jeep and squeaking open a five-bar gate. We rattled over a cattle grid.
“We’re officially on site now,” he said. “This is the old farm.”
Surrounding us were a thousand different greens—scrub, moss and grass—punctuated by vivid clumps of wild daffodils.
“Is that the only gate?” I asked.
“Should we get more?” He was so anxious. “Or a padlock?”
“No, no, nothing like that, we’re going to fix this. So that’s the main building?” A large farmhouse was being given the glass-and-gray-stone treatment.
“Granny and Grandad’s old house,” Lenehan said. “Where they’ll have the communal stuff like the yoga studio.”
I jumped from the jeep into a yard that was half mud, half concrete. Stacks of blocks, bags of cement and coils of wire were scattered about.
“This is the broken digger.” Lenehan indicated a tall orange machine, a can of Monster Energy still in the cup-holder. “Tipper Mahon, he’s the foreman, he’ll take it into Galway.”
“Oh!” I’d just spotted the first cottage. Cleverly situated in some sort of sneaky hollow, it was almost invisible.
As my eyes adjusted, I noticed one more. Then another. A virtue had been made of the rocky, uneven ground, so each cottage had exceptional privacy. This set-up became more impressive the more I looked. Much bigger than I’d imagined. I loved how the original landscape had barely been disturbed: a lot of care had been taken.
“How many cottages are there?”
“Sixteen. Most of them sleep two, but at the far end there”—Lenehan pointed into the distance—“There’s a two-bedroomed place, then one with three bedrooms. At the other end of the site we’ll have the spa.”
“It’s much bigger than I’d expected.”
“The retreat covers thirty acres. Then another twenty acres of no-man’s-land for privacy. Fifty acres.” To my uncomprehending face, he said, “Think of fifty football pitches.”
Again, not my area: I’d zero interest in football. But it sounded big.
“We’ll go over to that one.” Lenehan led me to a cottage that was structurally complete; even the planks for the roof were in place.
As we crested a hillock, the sea suddenly appeared. “Oh, look!” Shallow green water, so clear the pale sand at the bottom was visible, bordered by a perfect sickle of pristine beach. If it had been ten degrees warmer we could have been in the Caribbean.
“Are there islands out there?” I exclaimed.
“Just rocks, really.” But he smiled. “You can swim out to them.”
“Is that…?” Had I seen movement?
“Dolphins? Yeah. They’re always here.”
So there really were dolphins in Dolphin Cove? This place was perfect .
Up close, the cottage was just a concrete shell and roof beams. “So.” Lenehan led me into one of the rooms. Abruptly I stopped, shocked rigid. Ropes of bright red slashed the floors and interior walls. It was only paint but it looked more like blood.
“There’s no actual damage,” Lenehan reminded me.
“Yes. Yep. Absolutely.” I cleared my throat. “Did they do all the cottages?”
“Ah no. Only four,” he said. “But we need to talk to them.”
“Any idea who ‘them’ is?”
“No.” He looked very young. “Not a clue.”
“Don’t worry. We’ll sort it all out. I’ll head into town now. Call me if you need, you know, anything.”
“Sure.” That Adam’s apple again. I wanted to hug this poor boy until it hurt.
As we walked back to the jeep, a pickup truck came hurtling towards us, stopping with about an inch to spare. A man leapt from the cab, all sharp eyes and a bushy, black beard. “Tipper Mahon.” He strode towards me. “Site foreman. You must be the woman down from Dublin.”
“Anna Walsh.”
“My brother, Hal.” Tipper indicated a second man, a younger, skinnier version of himself.
Grinning widely, Hal loped forward, his energy somewhat untethered. The font of ancient wisdom which lived deep in my psyche cautioned strongly against ever getting drinks with this man. There would be some sort of “incident.” Perhaps involving an electric scooter. Or a rabbit. Or stolen wetsuits.
But my inner seventeen-year-old who liked “spontaneous’ and “mildly illegal” knew he’d be so much fun .
Tipper yanked his thumb at a third beardy man. “That’s Declan Erskine.”
Declan saluted me. Literally saluted.
“We’re bringing Betsey into Galway,” Tipper said.
“Betsey?”
“This brave lady here.” Tipper patted the side of the orange digger (boasting a sticker with the legend “Diggers do it standing up”).
“I’m sure this is hard for you all,” I said. “You’ve done beautiful work and to have it vandalized…”
Tipper clenched his jaw and stared over my head. “A shock all right.”
“Who do you think might have done it?”
Coughing out words, as if they were loose teeth, Tipper managed, “Some bad bastards.”
“That’s for sure.” I watched Hal and Declan let down a ramp at the back of their truck, then attach ropes to the wounded digger. “But have you any idea who they actually are?”
“Not a one and I wish I did. I’m sorry for young Lenehan here and all the Kearneys. But it’s hard on me and my crew too. No pay till it’s all sorted.”
Oh no, this was bad.
“We’ve wives and children,” Declan said.
“In all honesty, I’ve neither,” Hal called. “But there’s other expenses. I’m hopeless with money…”
Right. This had to be my first suggestion to Joey. “Lads, I can’t promise, but I’ll do my best to make sure you’re paid for the stoppage time.”
The three men seemed extremely surprised. “Well, now…that’s very decent. What did you say your name was, again? Anna? Anna Walsh? That’s a name we’ll remember.”
“I can’t promise,” I repeated. “But I’ll try.”